Proposed parking taxes meant to decrease congestion

Taxes on meters also needed, experts say

October 13, 2011|By Jon Hilkevitch, Tribune reporters

A plan the city announced Wednesday to impose a traffic congestion fee on drivers who park at downtown garages and lots represents a good first move to encourage more people to ride mass transit, but the new user tax should eventually include parking meters, transportation experts said.

In his 2012 proposed budget, Mayor Rahm Emanuel introduced what would be Chicago's first "congestion premium'' to ease Loop gridlock and raise $28 million a year for the CTA. An earlier attempt at congestion pricing during the Daley administration failed to take off.

Drivers parking in public garages and lots in the central business district would pay an extra $2 on weekdays under Emanuel's plan. It would come on top of the current $3 city parking tax that goes into the general fund, officials said.

Weekly parkers downtown who pay at least $60 at public garages and lots would face a congestion tax of $15 to $25, and the tax for monthly parkers who now pay $240 or more would range from $60 to $100.

The congestion fee would not affect people who own private parking spaces in downtown condominiums and other buildings, officials said.

The money generated by the new tax would be used to rebuild two CTA "L'' stations downtown (the specific stations are still to be determined) and launch a long-planned bus rapid transit system, officials said.

For drivers who complain they already are paying too much, in many cases $30 a day or more to park downtown, the congestion tax is intended to provide strong motivation to switch to buses and trains.

Megan Cotton, 23, who drives from the West Side to work downtown at JPMorgan Chase, said she understands the reasoning, but making parking more expensive is a bad move, she said.

"I don't get home from work until 11:30 p.m. or 12, and my safety is a big issue,'' said Cotton, a recent college graduate who pays a monthly fee to park at a garage on Adams Street east of State Street. "I wouldn't even be able to drive any more. That's a big increase. It's not cool to have us suffer.''

But Bob Elliott, an instructor at DePaul University's downtown campus who drives into the Loop twice a week, supports the strategy to prompt fewer people — just not him — to drive into the central area.

"If I were teaching every day, I would probably take public transit,'' Elliott said.

Asked whether $2 of extra tax on daily garage parking was high enough to spur more transit use and discourage driving, Peter Skosey, vice president of the Metropolitan Planning Council, said, "You have to try it and see.''

Many experts say that parking, particularly street parking, is underpriced in many cities when the costs of traffic congestion and pollution caused by vehicles circling the block looking for available parking is factored in.

Skosey said a next step might include extending the congestion premium to Chicago parking meters downtown and in the neighborhoods.

"Parking meter rates could be adjusted so that drivers pay less to park when plenty of spaces are available and more to park when demand is high,'' he said.

Former Mayor Richard M. Daley linked a plan to implement congestion charges on drivers parking downtown with a CTA experiment to launch rapid transit-style bus routes between downtown and the neighborhoods. The Bush administration awarded Chicago a $153 million grant in 2008 to support the construction of bus-only lanes for bus rapid transit.

But City Hall missed a deadline to raise downtown parking meter rates as part of the congestion-pricing strategy. As a result, the Federal Transit Administration rescinded the grant.